Frederick Barbarossa: Did you mean...?

Blitzkrieg ('lightning war') is a military tactic combining air and land forces deployed at speed against the enemy's weaker points while the rear lines are simultaneously disrupted by acts of sabotage...

Rudolf Hess (1894-1987) was deputy leader of the German Nazi Party and a key figure in the fascist regime of Adolf Hitler (1889-1945) until his bizarre decision in 1941 to fly to Scotland. Hess believed he could persuade Britain to...

"The Holy Roman Empire was in no way holy, nor Roman, nor an empire," wrote Voltaire, and this interpretation still dominates the popular imagination, so the Holy Roman Empire is treated as a bad joke, a pale...

Voltaire (1694-1778) was a French author, historian, and philosopher whose thoughts on religious toleration and moderation of authoritarian power were influential during the Enlightenment. His most famous work today is the satirical...

The American Civil War (1861-1865) was the pivotal event in United States history and the largest armed conflict in the Western world following the end of the Napoleonic Wars (1815) and prior to...

Odoacer (433-493 CE, reigned 476-493 CE) also known as Odovacar, Flavius Odoacer, and Flavius Odovacer, was the first king of Italy. His reign marked the end of the Roman Empire; he deposed the last emperor, Romulus Augustulus, on 4...

Bleeding Kansas' was a term coined by the New York Tribune in 1856, referring to the escalating hostilities in the Kansas Territory between pro-slavery activists and anti-slavery 'free staters'...

The Knight’s Revolt (1522-1523) was a military action led by the German imperial knight Franz von Sickingen (l. 1481-1523) and encouraged by the knight and writer Ulrich von Hutten (l. 1488-1523) launched to restore the status...

Charles Cornwallis (1738-1805), 1st Marquess and 2nd Earl Cornwallis, was a British military officer and statesman best known for surrendering to George Washington at the Siege of Yorktown, the final decisive engagement of the...

Joseph II, Holy Roman Emperor (1741-1790), was the son and successor of Maria Theresa (1717-1780) and Francis Stephen, aka Francis I (1708-1765), of the imperial house of the Habsburgs. He governed...